30Dec Friday, October 31, 2008 – Gloaming
Gloaming \GLOH-ming\, noun:
Twilight; dusk.
The children squealed and waved and smiled, their teeth flashing white in the gloaming.
— Evan Thomas, Robert Kennedy: His Life
It was the gloaming, when a man cannot make out if the nebulous figure he glimpses in the shadows is angel or demon, when the face of evening is stained by red clouds and wounded by lights.
— Homero Aridjis, 1492: The Life and Times of Juan Cabezon of Castile (translated by Betty Ferber)
Arrived at the village station on a wintry evening, when the gloaming is punctuated by the cheery household lamps, shining here and there like golden stars, through the leafless trees.
— Margaret Sangster
Gloaming comes from Old English glomung, from glom, “dusk.”
Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for gloaming
Here’s a suitably creepy and pretty video for Halloween!
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“‘Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door —
Only link, and nothing more.”